Anyone who browses the Quran would feel curious that almost always – some 22 times – it refers to the mountains as pegs. For, peg is something that goes into the ground. A ten’s pegs are more inside the ground than outside.
Refering to the massive rocks proudly standing on the surface of the earth as pegs does not seem to be appropriate; and the curiousness remained right until the modern times when the geologists, armed with advanced technology, and equipped with modern research tools discovered in the 1960s that to refer to the mountains as pegs is scientifically a perfect way of reference. No other term can be used so accurately. To pick up one instance, the Quan said:
Taking the shape of an inverted pyramid below the surface of the earth, mountains are more inside the earth than outside, the inner penetration being – peg-like – almost two-thirds of the outer elevation.
Not only the description of mountains as pegs is noticeable in the Qur’an, but also the fact that they have always been referred to in the plural. Never did the Qur’an, in its several citations, use the word in singular in this context. It always used the word in plural: mountains.
This is another accuracy that we notice in the Qur’an as we know that to ordinary observation mountains do not occur singly. They seem to occur as a series of mountains, or as groups where a tall one is hemmed by smaller ones around it, even if some may protrude by a few meters only.
Another point of note, as mentioned in passing earlier, is that although the curiosity remains until this day, the Qur’an – as in the above quote – speaks of the mountains as having been driven in from above. Says another verse:
Modern understanding is that the earth has several layers starting from its surface to its core. The surface layer, some 100 km thick, is referred to as the upper crust (or, roughly, lithosphere). This crust consists of some 40 pieces of broken plates. They are called tectonic plates which are composed of both oceanic as well as continental crust. Of these plates, seven are major ones on which the main continents rest.
It is suggested that the mountains appear as the result of shifts of the plates which when they plunge into each other, cause earthquakes and blow out lava that form the mountains; or just cause a protrusion that, with erosion over millions of years acquire the pyramidal shape.
At all events, the Qur’an maintains that the mountains were placed/pitched from the top. And the idea does not sound outlandish to science. After all, if iron could come from space, and in such huge quantities, then, why not rocks of great dimensions? This is something for science to investigate. The Qur’an cannot be wrong. Another verse of the Quran is specific about the mountains being brought from above:
an early commentator of the Quian, Zamakhshari of the 12h century, expressed the idea that the mountains could have roots. He wrote,
Ifyou asked, What’s the point in saying “from above”, instead of the simple, “He placed therein mountains,
” as He said elsewhere
in the Qur’an, “And We placed therein tall pegs,” (T7: 27) or,
“We placed in the earth mountains,” (21: 31) or, “We placed for it pegs,” (27: 61), I would say, perhaps there are pillars below for the (the mountains) to rest on, or they have been fixed therein like nails.’
Thus, alhough the idea of mountains having roots has a scientific history of around half a century, Muslim scholars played with the idea 800 years earlier. How could they have thought on such lines and express such an outlandish idea at all? It was because they knew, not by faith and dogma, but by experimentations and experiences, that the Quan is a Word from God, uncorrupted and incorruptible.
The Quan has something else to say about the mountains, which is more amazing for the fact that science found it out in as late as 1960s.
It said,
In Kathir, a Qur’anic commentator who appeared seven hundred years ago, wrote,
(وَجَعَلْنَا فِيهَا رَوَاسِيَ شَافِحَاتٍ) يَعْنِي: الْجِبَالَ، أَرْسَى بِمَا الأَرْضَ لِقَلا
تَمَيدَ وَتَضْطَرِبَ
“That is, He pegged the earth with mountains so that it may not tremble and quiver.”
Today’s science explains that although the upper crust movement has been a constant feature of the earth, it was more rapid in the past. At present it is stabilized at 3-6 cm per year. Life wouldn’t have been comfortable if the plates had been moving at faster speed as in the past: buildings would have been collapsing at quite good pace. And the major cause of this reduction in movements of the plates is the mountains.
Anas, (a Companion of the Prophet), reported that the Messenger of Allah said, “When Allah created the earth, it began to quiver; it calmed down.”
so He created the mountains and placed them upon it, as a result
As for modern theories that clash with the Qur anic statements, we need 10 wait for further rescarch. It would be naive to believe that science has
made its final statements.